How do you distinguish a thought experiment from imagination?Actual monkeys and typewriters aren't needed for the thought experiment. Mechanistic probabilitarians are imagining random character generation which can continue indefinitely.
Meaning, in this context, is a metaphysical property. The improbability of DNA ocurring by chance raises the question: does its ocurrence have cosmic meaning? — Chris Hughes
The thought experiment is: imagine a device producing random characters indefinitely. Probablity maths says it'll reproduce the works of Shakespeare.How do you distinguish a thought experiment from imagination?
Which has nothing to do with how the universe works from existing states to new states. The universe does not consist of new states coming about completely on their own without any prior cause, or present state-of-affairs, shaping what comes next.The thought experiment is: imagine a device producing random characters indefinitely. Probablity maths says it'll reproduce the works of Shakespeare. — Chris Hughes
The thought experiment is: imagine a device producing random characters indefinitely. Probablity maths says it'll reproduce the works of Shakespeare. — Me
It's similar to how you get from primeval soup to DNA. Until the ocurrence of DNA there was no evolution, so how did that amazingly complex molecule come to exist?Which has nothing to do with how the universe works from existing states to new states — You
Exactly - and my metaphysical question is: if the effect was DNA, and it was not randomly generated, was its cause cosmic meaning?Meaning, in this context, is that effects are about their causes, and not randomly generated.
Energy put into the a stable system.It's similar to how you get from primeval soup to DNA. Until the ocurrence of DNA there was no evolution, so how did that amazingly complex molecule come to exist? — Chris Hughes
They weren't random. They were based on existing conditions.Random chemical interactions took place over a very long time (like the imagined random character generator). Some may have resulted in proto-DNA structures, but without evolution (and without the benefit of the thought experiment's infinity), how would the huge number of exact steps needed go arrive at self-replicating life-forms have ocurred? — Chris Hughes
The pre-existing conditions of slightly less complex molecules coming together to form more complex ones thanks to the stable energy and environment that existed at that time.Exactly - and my metaphysical question is: if the effect is DNA, and it was not randomly generated, what's its cause? — Chris Hughes
Yet once you have life it isn't at all simply random. Mutations can be random, but what life forms adapt and prosper and what become extinct isn't at all random. The Darwinian aspect of evolution isn't at all random. You might say that an asteroid hitting the Earth 66 million years ago was a random event, but that small animals survived the extinction event and large animals couldn't cope with the dramatic changes isn't something random.my metaphysical question is: if the effect was DNA, and it was not randomly generated, was its cause cosmic meaning? - That's another way of saying "design". Design doesn't need a designer. Look at evolution. It only needs a process. In this hypothesis, one not yet understood. — Chris Hughes
I hope you mean evolution, not genetic modification. Either way, I'm asking about what meaning DNA's improbable ocurrence might have.Any meaning in DNA is there because of what we do with that DNA.
Yes - DNA is life, which evolves meaningfully. Was the evolution of humans, able to think about this, predictable?... life itself creates predictability and meaning
Once an animal species gets the ability to use complex language and furthermore use written language, then it's quite predictable that we will have these discussions in some way.Was the evolution of humans, able to think about this, predictable? — Chris Hughes
If you mean we should assume there's separate DNA life elsewhere in the universe, then yes, the ocurrence of DNA is less improbable. That's kind of circular, thoughIf we assume that life isn't unique to humans, then the probability of it arising isn't infinitesimally small.
Yes, we should - and we are. And we can help each other.... we cannot comprehend it. But we should always try.
I don't see the problem here. — Chris Hughes
The works of Shakespeare (the product of his mind) are the subject of the monkeys/typewriters thought experiment, which is used by many scientists to defend the idea that DNA code could arise by chance, given a very long time.
No, I'm not - I'm an agnostic. I'm speculating that, given the improbability of the ocurrence of DNA, there may be a design-like process analagous to evolution at work in the universe.... you're a true believer
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